Some forward thinking from the ICC. Finally!

One other thing, I don't know of a single person anywhere that thinks mainstream America will take to cricket. But the people who disregard development there are deluding themselves into the size of cricket's actual depth. New Zealand is consistently ranked around 6-8, and they have a playing base of 100,000 people. If cricket in the USA reached that level - and therefore the national team reached a similar level of competitiveness - it would represent 1/30 of 1% of the total population. Cricket won't be mainstream, but the USA has a lot of niche markets. Cycling and rugby both have 60,000+ competitive participants, and neither are mainstream in any sense of the word. If US cricket wasn't such a basket-case, cricket could easily match those numbers (they are half-way there already). And that's the point. No sensible person should expect associate teams to develop into Australia or England or India. That doesn't happen. But there is a large number of nations that could meet the standards set by Zimbabwe, New Zealand or Sri Lanka, and cricket doesn't need to be mainstream for that to happen. But it does need to be set up to cater for varying standards of play, and at the top level it isn't.

Brendon, nice rant but you entirely missed my earlier point. I don't really care whether cricket is mainstream, niche or non-existent in the Netherlands; that is a problem for Dutch cricket. If they continue to be a middle ranked country floating around the top-20 then so be it. The question is why you are second-guessing the quality of emerging sides instead of merely opening up the competition to whoever succeeds. Afghanistan may well be the best long-term prospect in world cricket, but if they don't perform on the field then they don't deserve to play against the better sides. If Ireland or Scotland do, then they should. The World Cup is not a development tournament, nor should it be. It can and should have teams in it with little prospect of winning the trophy as world cups in every sport do. But the claim put forward that this is the big chance for developing nations is a nonsense. It is only a big opportunity for them because cricket's scheduling and structure is so ridiculously elitist. And you are wrong about Scotland, they came second on the I-Cup and WCL1 last year (much improved on 2009 and ahead of Afghanistan), they are a largely home-grown side, have a decent playing base, and have several players that have been picked up for county contracts. They are not at Ireland's level, but over the long term, they'll play at roughly the same level - and indeed, will have a healthy rivalry. They would have been a far better prospect at this world cup than either Kenya or Canada, but if the ICC holds the qualifiers two years in advance of the main tournament what more can you expect?

Better late than never. Firstly, Ireland has surpassed Netherlands by a MASSIVE margin in mere YEARS. In the past two world cups Ireland has beaten Pakistan, Bangladesh and England. You could put Netherlands, Scotland and Canada together and their accomplishments dont match that. Australia even lost a match to the Netherlands in the 1960's. They've qualified for four of the past five world cups and done nothing - unlike Ireland and Kenya. Cricket has been played in Netherlands for well over 100+ years but in modern times its just a niche sport and, more importantly, has NOT show ANY signs of GROWTH. The level that it is now is the level it will always be. And considering there is only a couple of thousand of players paying cricket they can never produce a world class team. What part of "Dutch cricket will never become mainstream" dont you understand? If the Netherlands has not become a top nation IT NEVER WILL. And as I pointed out since the Netherlands is a prosperous and stable country with good cricketing facilities they can produce decent cricketers from the few thousand who play. Its much easier for them to produce competitive cricketers (or entice players from other countries) being a wealthy and prosperous country. And lets not forget that, like England, nearly half the team is South African. For example in the England v Netherlands game 7/11 "Dutch" players were born in other countries. Do you really think Ryan ten Doeschate was born in Holland? 13/15 of the "Canadian" squad were not born in Canada. John Davidson is Canadian born. But he grew up in Australia and learned to play cricket here. The only other Canadian born player in the squad is Zubin Surkari. Obviously 1st generation Canadian from Indian/Pakistani parents. Cricket has NO recognition in mainstream Canada. IF you think cricket will ever catch on in Canada you're as deluded as the poor fools who think the USA will take to cricket. Neither America or American Jr will take to cricket. And the Netherlands has been sliding for some time in cricket. They won the ICC Trophy in 2001 but have done poorly in the 2005 and 2009 editions. While Scotland won the 2005 tournament against Ireland they've done nothing since and are clearly on the decline dropping to 6th place in the 2009 tournament, failing to qualify for the world cup. Compare that to the rise from Ireland. Scottish cricket is NOWHERE near the level or Irish cricket. In comparison in 2009 ICC Trophy Ireland won 11/13 matches thumping Canada in the final. The only two games Ireland lost were, funnily enough, Afghanistan and Kenya - the two other most promising countries. Ireland beat Canada twice comfortably, Scotland and Netherlands. It doesnt really matter how long it took India or New Zealand to win a game. Are we talking about test cricket? No. And what the hell football and Messi has to do this I dont know. I'm not "trashing" Netherlands, Canada or Scotland. I'm just stating what is obvious to any person who is knowledgeable about cricket, that these 3 countries will NEVER become top nations. It doesn't matter how many world cups they play in. Its not the first world cup for Canada either. I'm all for developing cricket in other countries and the World Cup is a good way of doing that. But do you people REALLY think that Netherlands, Scotland or Canada are a better long term prospect than Afghanistan? In the long term Afghanistan will most likely become the 12th full international cricketing country (after Ireland) so it would be more beneficial for them to participate than either Netherlands or Canada.

Russ, that's a fascinating comparison, and very illuminating. The only flaw being that it's only the top six in cricket who are truly contenders, whereas all of that top ten are. But even if you included a couple of less formidable teams, and the group read Spain, Germany, England, France, South Korea, Chile, Australia, the bottom three would still have very little chance of qualifying. So your analogy certainly stands. Then add to that the top four getting to play each other dozens of times a year to hone their skills, while the bottom three play one or two matches a year against top opposition, and a handful of games against lower-ranked teams. In truth it's a remarkable result that the Associates can even match it to the extent that they do.

They were my pre-tournament tip, and I think I'll stick with them. Malinga is the most exciting limited-overs player in the world for mine - every time he has the ball you get the feeling something extraordinary could happen. The only man to take two hat-tricks at World Cups speaks for itself. Murali is not the force he was, but is still a fine operator. Mendis may have been worked out by India, but the likes of Australia have played very little against him. Then there are other spinners who can step in, like Herath, and Dilshan who did so well yesterday (four wickets for four runs, would have had five and a hat-trick had a catch not gone down). Batting-wise, Dilshan and Tharanga had the second-highest WC opening partnership yesterday, Jayawardene and Sangakkara are in top form and two of the classiest batsmen in the world, Mathews has been a little down but is a finisher in the league of Morgan, Hussey, and Duminy, and they have Samaraweera, with a Test average of over 54, coming in at No. 8. Their one weakness is a good second paceman - Fernando is solid, but not devastating. Aside from all this, Sri Lanka seem to have a calm and a deep belief about them, that I think stems from their captain, and this could come to the fore in some tight games later. (Or, I could be completely wrong. We'll see.) India, for mine, have tremendous batting riches, but as we saw against England and even Bangladesh, not really the bowling to defend their totals. Zaheer and Harbhajan are the only truly class bowlers they have, and Harbhajan seems to have lost some spark in the last couple of years, leaking a lot of runs and looking far less dangerous. An injury to Zaheer and they're baked.

Some interesting info there - thanks. Growing the game always a plus, no matter how it happens. Sometimes it needs a push, sometimes better not to - last thing we need is some heavy handed organisation cutting up the young shoots to suit itself, but at the same time agree that a little funding never hurts.

Brendon, maybe, maybe not. What is a cricket field but an extra large patch of grass. Perhaps they build one field - a national cricket stadium with 20,000 capacity, that because of its large playing area can be used for multiple events. Perhaps they erect temporary stands around two adjacent football fields where the turf pitch is dropped into the centre between the fields, then give the grounds to the local community (for both sports). The white elephants of olympics are the 100,000 seat stadiums that are never filled again, and the single purpose arenas which need to attract championships to justify the grand-stands. Cricket just needs space and a grass hill in a middle class suburb; every potential host has plenty of those.

Iopati, there are lots of teams playing cricket. 48 in global competitions, the bottom being division eight, played in Kuwait in November last year; and another 57 in regional competition. They travel and play widely, as well as in regional competitions (tiered). The trouble really is the test teams, they have the playing bases, and the funding and professional structure to dominate those below them; and they don't have any real interest in playing for less money against their inferiors (be they an associate or a weak test team); or in allowing anyone to join their exclusive little club. Perhaps the best thing associate cricket could get is an interest in it from cricket supporters. If tv companies bought the rights to the I-Cup and associated games then there would be a revenue stream that by-passes the full members. If they could use that money to create first class leagues, then they'd improve rapidly. Perhaps that is closer to happening than we realise, given Ireland's efforts in this world cup and popularity. As negative as people like myself who follow associate cricket can be about the ICC and the full members, things are improving.

Fair enough, I was thinking of a much better world where more countries play cricket - even at best many many many years away. But asking Holland to travel to Zimbabwe or visa-versa as originally suggested isn't going to happen for a long time either, as mentioned some of their players are part time, the teams no where near that well funded. It was just an idea to use and build on traditional rivalries to get more countries involved. Ask Canada who they would most like to beat, (without naming a sport) answer would be USA. Ask Holland and their answer is Germany. Germany - France, and so on. Directly asking France to play cricket will never work, it's beneath them. But a few years of Germany bragging that they are the European champions and France dare not even compete may change that (that is after Holland taunted Germany in exactly the same way). Problem is Holland can sort of make that claim now (for continental Europe - leaving UK out) but it's not really known even in Holland. A few paid adverts (the ones that look like articles) might be a sneaky way to start the ball rolling. Likewise in North America. Likewise in Africa (if they can pretend South Africa is not included). As I said, just an idea. Plausible? - maybe.

Just out of curiosity Geoff, are Sri Lanka still your tip? I've been a lot more impressed by India, personally.

Geoff, even in a team context, depth comes in to play, and the best teams have great depth. A little by the by, but if football was structured like cricket with 10 full members they'd probably be Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, England, Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Germany and Netherlands. So if Australia scraped into a 14 team world cup (which is feasible) they'd be confronted with a group like this: Spain, Germany, England, France, Portugal, Croatia, Australia. Now, be honest, do you think they'd get into fourth place? Or even be competitive in most matches? That's pretty much what the Netherlands is faced with in their CWC2011 group. By and large, I think they've competed pretty well, but the structure means they play a lot of quality opposition with little respite.

lopati, the trouble with any regional qualifiers is the lack of competition in most regions (East-Asia Pacific, Europe, Americas). The way around that is to merge the regions into three (Asia, Northern Hemisphere, Southern Hemisphere). But once you've done that, why play qualifiers when you could play a regional championship? That is, two years out from the world cup play 8 team regional championships (2 groups of 4, then a super-4, then a final - 19 games over 3 weeks), with associates qualifying amongst themselves in the previous year. Top 3 from Asia and South, top 2 from North to progress. The rest to play in a qualifiers the following year (a tournament or tours) to decide the other spots (depending on how many that is). That way the top associates are playing top teams every two years, and weak full members 3 in 4 years. And it gives them some realistic goals to aim at (qualification, getting past the first round, etc.)

Russ and Brendon - I'm agreeing with Russ entirely. Something like football, with its low-scoring nature, gives a much higher chance for a well-drilled yet lower-ranked team to defend out a draw or snatch a result (Italy vs New Zealand at the last WC, for instance). Cricket's scoring makes this less likely, and in terms of bowler vs batsman, picks out two players to confront each other one on one. If the gulf of quality is there, it'll be seen. If you had one-on-one football with Lionel Messi taking on one Uzbekistani centre-back, the Flea would surely win. In a team context, it's different. Brendon, India took twenty years from their admittance into Test cricket to actually win a match. Twenty years. New Zealand took 27. Sri Lanka were firmly beaten at two World Cups before they were even a Test nation, then were a weak Test side for years more. Yet they came through and won in 1996, and are now one of the best in the world - my tip for this year's title. The teams you're mentioning have been to two or three World Cups, and barely play any high-level cricket in between them. Even the Aussies would struggle if they played only a handful of games each year. This rests firmly with the ICC. But on your logic, India, Sri Lanka and New Zealand would all have been turfed out for being too mediocre years ago. And cricket would be a pretty lonely place now if they had.

Brendon, you are second guessing the quality of teams. And for what purpose? If a team can compete, they ought to be able to compete, if they can't, then so be it, they can play at lower levels. The problem in cricket is we've made a very sharp distinction between good and bad, that is entirely unnecessary, and subsequently exacerbates any differences by focusing games amongst the strong, at the expense of the weak's development. You are unduly harsh on Scotland, which has a thriving cricket community on par with Ireland - and they are a close match to them on the field. Kenya's problems were partly domestic, but they were also purely cricket related. In 2003, they had a very fine generation of players who were all past 30. They, like Canada, qualified two years ago, but came to this world cup with quite young sides (a few stalwarts like Tikolo and Davison apart). And they just plain aren't as good as their predecessors. We ought to be familiar with that in Australia. What we can too easily forget is that these teams we are bad-mouthing are on the verge of the top-10 best teams in the world, followed by a growing list of relatively competitive nations. But there isn't a sport in existence where the 10-20th best team/player is able to match the top three or four, and cricket, by dint of its scoring, tends to make those differences quite pronounced. What I want from a world cup is a proper competition, set in stages, where in each stage, every team involved has a roughly 50% chance of going through to the next stage. In football, Germany has never missed the knock-out stages at a world cup, Brazil just once in 80 years. Yet neither team went to the last world cup and moaned about playing useless teams like Australia who didn't have a chance of winning the trophy. They rolled into the latter stages focused on their goal: winning; and Australia focused on theirs: trying to qualify from the group stages, by playing well in the 2 matches against teams of the same level. The problem with this world cup is its practically impossible for Kenya or Canada to qualify, and their match against each other was entirely for pride. That's what happens if all you care about in a tournament is who wins, and not the small stories that come with participating in the sport's marquee event.

Champions Trophy useless? The 2009 tournament was a success with good quality matches. The tournament was short and sweet - 8 teams in 2 groups of 4 with the top 2 going into semis and then a final. Group think and received wisdom. Did you actually watch the 2009 tournament? Doubt it. Problem with holding a tournament for associate countries where winners qualify is that countries like Netherlands waste a spot. Cricket is only a small, niche sport in Netherlands but its well established and with the Netherlands being a wealthy, stable country they have good infrastructure and can afford the high cost of equipment. The Netherlands has been playing in world cups for years and done nothing. Cricket is never going to develop in Netherlands if after all this time it hasn't already. Put Scotland in the same category. Similar deal with Canada. Its just a team of ex-pats. The game will not grow further than the ex-pat communities. There is really no point in having countries like Netherlands or Canada in the world cup. Kenya is a different situation. From their high in the 2003 tournament they have not progressed but part of that could be attributed to domestic problems in a similar way that domestic issues has impacted Zimbabwe. But unlike Netherlands and Canada virtually the whole Kenyan team is Kenyan born. But I dont think that developing cricket in Kenya should be given up - if the country can have a long prosperous, stable period I think cricket will flourish as the number 2 sport there. Ireland and Afghanistan are obviously the brightest prospects and should get the focus on development. But unfortunately Afghanistan missed out on a world cup spot by teams that have no long term prospect. We need a world cup where non-test playing countries that have a real chance of developing cricket into a major sport and the ability to improve.

Impossible for Cricket to become an Olympic sport. There is no way a non cricketing country could host a cricket tournament without MASSIVE money from the ICC. For example how the hell would Rio build enough cricket stadiums that met international requirements for 2016 and what the hell would they do with a bunch of cricket grounds after the games? There is no way imaginable that the ICC members would vote cricket in and have every potential city thinking of bidding for the summer games, that wasnt already a test playing country, up in arms over having to build a bunch of extremely expensive white elephants that have no use afterwards. Think about it.

I'd tweak it a bit, I realise it's just a suggestion but in your group A you have Ireland and Zimbabwe, group B has holland and Kenya. While it's admirable to mix it up like that remember these assosate teams aren't that well funded, many include part timers taking annual leave to compete. Perhaps the soccer model would be best, regional qualifiers. OK some regeons could struggle but so be it. For example, America's: if Canada is the only entrant and qualifies by default make it big news in their press, USA won't wear that sort of embarrasment for too long. (They can later rope in Mexico and perhaps some other Caribbean teams to make up numbers.) Down the track the automtic entry of WI would is removed forcing them to play in the America's qualifying rounds. Likewise Asia can include Malaysia, Hong Kong, Thailand, Indonesia and China, Oceana for the pacific island nations and so on, later including NZ and Aus. Number of qualifiers per region pro-rated to accomodate small regions (less) vs larger regeons (more) so say every team has at least a 1 in 3 chance of making the WC round. (i,e, 1-3 teams = 1 entrant, 4-6 teams = 2 entrants, 7 - 9 = 3). Of course previous winner get automatic qualification to defend the title. In this way costs and play off schedules can be kept reasonable - and qualifying competition can built on traditional regional sporting rivalries. What does Kenya care about Holland? More likely they would like to show Zimbabwe up. Likewise it doesn't need many yanks to get their backs up about Canada outclassing them, but they couldn't care less about Scotland.

Best piece you've written, Ben.

Well written, Ben, and on the money. You're quite right that Vinay was one of the sternest examiners of CA and the ICC in Australian media. Long may we follow his example. "If the Associates have to be made to earn their place, so can a few others above them for a change." That's what I've been thinking too. The main issue for the ICC is that if a team like Bangladesh or a volatile Pakistan collapse in the qualifiers to end up out of the World Cup, the ICC loses a couple of hundred million potential viewers, ruining the estimates that their broadcast rights sales are based on. But as I wrote the other day, when teams like Bangladesh, West Indies, Zimbabwe and New Zealand are heavily spanked by the sides marginally above them on the rankings table, you have to wonder why they should qualify automatically ahead of an Ireland or a Holland.